Ensorcelled
by Ariadne'sThread
Summary: And Helena was happy. But as the nights grew longer and darker and what sun there was was high, cold and faraway, she began to wonder. After the curtains go down, Helena and Demetrius have some issues to work out.


**Written for utensilestrength on Yuletide Treasure in response to a prompt asking for a fic explaining why Demetrius loved Helena after the spell had been lifted. I hope she'll forgive me for using the explanation my former English teacher gave me: because, in his case, it wasn't.**

**As always, feedback is appreciated, especially constructive criticism. But if you want to say nice things about me that's okay too. You know. If you must. ;)**

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The summer after the Duke's wedding to the Queen of the Amazons was long and perfect; the sun was warm but not hot enough to scorch, hay turned golden in the fields and fruit swelled on the bough in readiness for autumn.

Not that Helena noticed. She was still reeling from the events of that midsummer's night: it seemed so odd to think that once her Demetrius –now the most loving and devoted of husbands- had once scorned her, or that Hermia and Lysander had fled the city only to appeal successfully to the Duke the next day. Come to think of it, the events that night seemed oddly distant, as though she was watching them unfold at a great distance, or through mist.

There had been no leisure to reflect at the time: there had been a scramble to get everything ready for the wedding, then the ceremony itself and then the wedding night…

Nothing about her fiance's sudden change of heart had alarmed her, not then. Hadn't he told her he wanted to marry her? Hadn't he sworn in front of all of Athens that she was his wife? Wasn't he constant and exclusive in his attentions towards her? Helena swept it aside, shrugging his courtship of Hermia off as youthful indiscretion.

Autumn came and the world turned golden. Fruit fell from the branches and vegetables were brought in by the bushel. Helena and her husband walked through the woods admiring the changing colours of the leaves and the crisp, cool feeling to the air.

It was not until Hermia and Lysander's first argument that Helena began to worry. Hermia had been distraught and Helena –feeling guiltily superior- had said all the things you were supposed to say to newlyweds who argue: that it was normal and healthy and couples who bottled up their feelings ended up with a cellar full of hoarded grievances, maturing and gaining potency over the years. It was not until Hermia had dried her eyes and gone to make up with Lysander that it had occurred to Helena that she and Demetrius had never argued. Not even once.

They had not even properly disagreed. Sometimes Demetrius would want to do one thing and she would want to do another, but he would instantly capitulate without seeming to mind it. Helena would sometimes object on his behalf but he would insist. The only thing he wanted, he would assure her, kissing her on the forehead, was for her to be happy.

And Helena was happy. But as the nights grew longer and darker and what sun there was was high, cold and faraway, she began to wonder. She looked at Hermia and Lysander. How different from herself and Demetrius.

"Haven't you noticed?" Hermia asked in exasperation, when Helena confided in her. "Whatever he's doing, he always orients himself towards you. He doesn't just love you: he worships you."

"Is that…" Helena paused. "Is that normal?"

"Sometimes," Hermia said, a little wistfully. "But every minute of every day? You're lucky."

Helena didn't feel lucky. She felt nothing.

Later, she looked into Demetrius' eyes and saw nothing of him except his love for her. No thoughts or dreams of his own. She had never been truly afraid before that moment.

It was around that time that the dreams started. 'Dreams' was too tame a word for them but neither were they nightmares. They always started with her alone in the woods, unable to find Hermia and Lysander and having lost Demetrius. Things moved in the shadows of those woods and the breeze carried faint silvery laughter, which she had a feeling was directed at her.

In her dreams she was not always herself. Sometimes she would be outside her body, watching the events unfold; sometimes she would be much younger; and sometimes she would be someone else entirely, someone who was moved by her situation and had decided to do something about it.

Buds opened, timidly at first, and then in droves, making the tree tops look as though they were covered in a green mist. The days lengthened and animals came out of hibernation. Helena ignored them. Demetrius worried. Hermia and Lysander became concerned about both of them. Helena was frantic, pacing the corridors of her home like a cornered animal. She was close to the truth and it reared –unknown and unwelcome- above her.

One day she heard two of the maids giggling together about love-in-idleness. They were surprised and not a little bit remorseful at having been caught chatting, but one of them was bolder than the other and explained. It was a kind of pansy, no doubt she knew it by another name, but common folk called it love-in-idleness. They said –the maid told her, dropping her voice conspiratorially- that it was the main ingredient of love potions and that if you went into the woods to look for it the fairies hid it from view. –What fairies, Helena asked.- Why, the fairies in the wood.

Helena knew what she had to do. She called Demetrius and together they went into the wood. He followed her immediately, without a word. She wondered if she had ever been that submissive and shuddered a little at the thought. It was midsummer's day.

The woods were beautiful and Demetrius kept stopping to point out a bird or pluck her a flower. The trees were in full leaf, blotting out the sky and covering the forest floor in a patchwork of green light. She held his hand tight, making the most of his attention while it lasted. She did not have to concentrate on the path, winding and indistinct as it was: after all, she had been here before.

The clearing where they had awakened a year ago was unchanged. Helena half expected to see four indentations in the mossy ground, where the four of them had woken, stunned and unsure how they had come to be there. She sat down on the ground and looked up at the sun through a gap in the forest canopy. It was almost noon.

She was just wondering if this was the right clearing, whether she should have told someone where they were going and what on earth she was going to do now, when she heard laughter coming through the trees.

Rather it was two distinct kinds of laughter: a coquettish giggle and one that was distinctly male. It was accompanied by a general rustling of leaves and careless footfalls as though made by two people who were paying no great deal of attention to were they were going. Two figures –moving almost as one- followed the noise into the clearing and Helena coughed discreetly to let them know she was there.

Both figures turned. From there expressions Helena guessed that she was not the person they had expected (or perhaps feared), but was equally as unwelcome. The girl (a lithe, lively-looking thing with blossom in her hair) started. There was a sudden shower of leaves and petals where the girl had been and then nothing at all.

The boy merely looked down at his own hand, which had previously been holding the fairy girl's slender one but was now brushed with blossom. Then he turned his gaze to Helena. It was not a particularly friendly look.

He could have passed for human. It was only there, in the forest, where Helena knew what she was looking at, that she noticed how unnaturally dark his eyes were, how long his fingers and how pointed his features. His clothes were outlandish and seemed to be constructed partly from plants and his feet were bare. He looked at Helena as though she were an animal that had done something unusual and he had a passing interest to see if she'd do it again.

"I-" Helena's voice died in her throat. It occurred to her how ridiculous it had been to come here with no idea of what to say. She had imagined finding the fairies would be the difficult part. She had been wrong.

Instinctively, she looked to Demetrius. He had not even stood up. He was gazing at her in a parody of adoration, far stronger and far worse than anything she had seen before.

"W-What did you do to him?" she demanded, turning back to the strange boy.

There was a blur and he was by Demetrius' side. Helena gasped and then felt foolish. But the boy wasn't looking at her; he was peering into Demetrius' eyes. Whether Demetrius couldn't see him or simply didn't care, Helena was not willing to speculate.

"Love-in-idleness," he said, looking at Helena with his too-dark eyes. There was something oddly familiar about his voice. "Hard to find and harder to prepare correctly. How did you come by it?"

"I didn't," Helena said, more sharply than she'd intended. There was something about the boy's gaze that made her uncomfortable. "We came here a year ago. He's been… infatuated, but never as badly as this."

"Oh!" The boy's face slid into a smirk. Despite Helena's wishes to the contrary, it did not make him any less attractive. "The spurned Athenian maid, spurned no longer. And a maid no longer either…"

Helena glared at him, despite the blush burning across her cheeks.

"I want him back."

"Bringing him here strengthened the spell," he told her. It occurred to Helena that he was not a boy at all: he might have been older than her, it was hard to tell. "It'll wear off when you leave."

"I want him _back_," Helena emphasised, fighting to keep her voice even. "I want him to be in control of his own mind. I want a _husband_, not a…a _puppet_."

"You understand that the enchantment is the only reason he consented to marry you," the boy said, looking at her with dark eyes.

Helena nodded.

"Well then." Far too suddenly the boy was by her side, his arm locked around her waist. "You had best come with me."

There was a blur and a sudden sensation of speed and the two of them were somewhere else entirely. Helena stumbled away indignantly, barely keeping her footing. Quite apart from the shock, there was something about his touch that she didn't like.

Helena's mind, scrambled from travelling at speeds that humans were never intended to, became aware of the voice before her vision stopped spinning. It was a woman's voice, sweeter and more commanding than any voice Helena had heard before.

"I thought we had seen the last of her here." It sounded put out, both petulant and accusing.

"Robin," a second voice said. It was a man's voice and put Helena inexplicably in mind of autumn. "Why did you bring her here?"

"She found out about the enchantment," the boy said with a shrug. "She wants it lifted."

Helena looked up and saw that she was in a clearing that was full of a great many people. It was hard to guess how many people there were: many of them were partially hidden in bushes or up trees, and –on closer inspection- some of them appeared in some way to _be_ trees. But all of these people faded into the background compared to the pair who were speaking.

They were seated on thrones made from living wood. The man was tall and wore a coat the colour of oak leaves in the autumn and the woman had something of a cat in her poise and her slanted eyes. Both of them had something in their posture that marked them out of nobility. Helena knelt.

"Well, she has some sense," the fairy queen sniffed, turning to her king. "I suppose you know nothing of this."

"It's not me who brings mortals into the forest," the king replied. To Helena's ears his tone sounded a little sharp. "I haven't seen her since she was last here, a year ago."

"You favoured her from the start!"

"My lord," the boy –Robin- interrupted, in an apparent effort to keep the peace. "The enchantment."

"Has the Athenian youth displeased her?" the king asked.

There was a silence and Helena realised that it was her and not the boy who was supposed to reply.

"No sire."

"Well, does she love someone else?" the queen demanded impatiently.

"No, ma'am."

"Then why is she here?"

"It's wrong... I mean...he's my husband," Helena faltered. "Just because he can't be held responsible for his vows doesn't mean I don't have to uphold mine. I can't… I won't take away his free will."

"Indeed." The queen frowned, giving the king a dark look. "Puck, break the enchantment and escort the pair of them out of the forest."

"Swifter than a Spartan spear," the boy said, and in a blink, the fairies and the clearing were gone, leaving Demetrius in their place.

"You sure about this?" the boy asked.

Helena looked at Demetrius, his handsome face become quite horrible from slack jawed adoration.

"Quite sure."

The boy spat into his palm and, without ceremony, dabbed a little spittle onto each of Demetrius' eyelids with his thumb.

"Follow the path ahead of you. It'll take you home."

Helena turned to ask what she should tell Demetrius, but the boy had already gone.

Demetrius was stirring out of his stupor, his grey eyes looking troubled.

"Helena?" he asked, getting unsteadily to his feet. "What happened?"

"What do you remember?"

"It's midsummer's day…" Demetrius frowned. "The sun's hot, even in this shade. We should go home. You look pale."

Helena tried to say something, but the words caught in her throat and got tangled up. Came out as tears. She threw her arms around his neck and held onto him tight.

"You know, I never noticed before," Demetrius said, pushing Helena's hair out of her face and looking questioningly into her eyes. "But you are the most infuriating woman. Come on, you'll fell better back at the villa."

Helena, not sure of what was happening, let him lead her down the fairy path and back home.

Two pairs of eyes watched them go.

"You think he'll leave her?" the fairy girl asked, toying with her blonde hair.

The boy shrugged, lacing his fingers through hers. "It could go either way. He's fickle. Maybe she'll be less dependent on him now."

"That _is_ an unpardonable fault in women," the girl said archly. There was a sudden drift of blossom, and then she was gone.

-Finis-


End file.
